VEEDER: Finding calm in the mess we call ‘life’

February 9, 2018

After three long, agonizing months in and out of intensive care unit in a Minneapolis hospital battling pancreatitis and fighting for his life, my dad is set to come home to the ranch in a few weeks.

Friends are calling wondering what they can do, making plans to clear the driveway, buy groceries and welcome him back, and we are so very grateful.

And while I want to say that we're all finally able to let that breath out that we've been holding in all this time, I'm not so sure that it's entirely true yet. When a loved one has gone through such a traumatic, life-threatening experience, I'm not sure when you begin to trust that that it's truly over. He's coming home, but he's got a long road to recovery, one that will be done out here, so far from the team of experts that saved his life.

It's times like these the isolation of rural living sinks in. And it can scare you if you let it. The fact that my dad made it all those miles between the cold buttes and coulees of the ranch to a place with skyscrapers and sidewalks that could save him is truly a miracle that wouldn't be possible in a different time. And now, somehow, it feels like years since we had him here, home and healthy with us. These months have passed slowly.

Last weekend my great uncle stopped by the house to visit. He's one of the three remaining children of 12 born just down the road from the ranch.

"Come on in, it's a mess, but that's life," I said as I hugged him with my free arm, my sleeping baby in the other, my toddler behind us with the door open sitting naked on the potty.

I replayed those words in my head for days since I blurted them. It's a phrase I'd never uttered before and one that may have resonated with him had I not said it with such haste in an attempt to explain away my housekeeping skills.

Because he just recently lost his wife after a long health battle and he came home for a visit with his brothers.

"It's a mess, but that's life ..."

He stood in my kitchen, surrounded by the remnants of breakfast and Edie's art project and our small talk about weather turned to a story about his immigrant father and how he rode his bike 80-some miles across the prairie to borrow a wagon to pick up his bride.

"Can you imagine what my mother was thinking? I don't know if she knew what she was getting into ..."

I couldn't help but think then, that what she got herself into brought us to that moment in my kitchen that day, comforting one another, worrying about Dad's homecoming and smiling as that man, who has known much more mess in this life than stray socks and spilled orange juice, called my daughters beautiful.

These are the reasons we stay here, standing brave, holding our breath, in this mess of a life.

Jessie Veeder is a musician and writer living with her husband and daughter on a ranch near Watford City, N.D. She blogs at veederranch.com. Readers can reach her at jessieveeder@gmail.com.